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Firms Get Away with Selling Untested DRAM

Posted by timothy on from the cheap-n-cheerful dept.

peppytech75 writes "Melanie Hollands in IT Manager's Journal reports that 'In recent months, some Asian DRAM memory manufacturers have been getting away with selling untested ("UTT") DRAMs. Disturbingly, the practice seems to be getting traction at the lower portion of the module business. This is being done mostly by Taiwanese DRAM makers, who are undercutting the tier-1 guys by selling untested and unmarked parts.' What's the solution here? Or is there an actual solution to what amounts to pirate companies issuing counterfeit parts?" (IT Manager's Journal, like Slashdot, is part of OSTG.)

12 of 344 comments (clear)

  1. unmarked and untested == pirated? by qwertphobia · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't follow this analogy...

    --
    Never ask for directions from a two-headed tourist! -Big Bird
    1. Re:unmarked and untested == pirated? by akadruid · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Piracy = buzzword = whatever you want it to mean.

      My neighbour pirated my parking space. That guy pirated my seat on the train. All it means is 'they've got my toys, mummy'.

      In the UK, we have big posters at cinemas which declare 'Piracy funds Terrorism'. Which is beautiful, since its 100% true, and depends completely on people misunderstanding it.

      --
      "Those who cast the votes decide nothing; those who count the votes decide everything." (attrib. Joseph Stalin)
    2. Re:unmarked and untested == pirated? by FidelCatsro · · Score: 4, Insightful
      I was about to say the exact same thing , This is capitalism in action .

      If these chips sell to people under no false pretense about what they are and there is a market for them then what exactly are they doing wrong .
      If they are mislabeling them then yes that is very much illegal , but mostly they make no claim to this , If you want to risk buying these chips then fair enough .
      They are mostly not pirates though and labeling them that because they are undercutting other firms sounds like a dubious marketing ploy.
      The major risk as I see it is a batch of modules gets into a major user (think IBM, H-P, and/or Dell) and fails (probably in Asia). The user goes publicly ballistic over the combination of faulty material and the supplier's inability to control the quality of its material. The press runs with it and the unlucky DRAM supplier's stock gets hammered. Some time afterward, it emerges that all the DRAM suppliers have this risk and then they all go down.
      If this hapens then its the fault of the companys such as IBM ,HP or dell for not testing these products before shipping , i very much doubt that IBM would fail to run a memory test before shipping a server though.

      If as she says they are being sold as tested moduals then this is illegal and the practice can be stoped fairly easily and is no threat to the Semi conductor bussiness .

      --
      The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
  2. Why do people buy cheap ram? by flibble-san · · Score: 5, Insightful

    These days I don't reccomend anyone to buy cheap no-name unbranded RAM. Of all the PC hardware problems I've had over the years, about 80% are down to bad faulty generic RAM. I know only use Crucial or Kingston. They check the RAM, I know the RAM I buy is going to be working. RAM is one of the most important parts of any computer system. Is it really worth saving the £3-£5 by getting cheap unbranded RAM? As the saying goes, you get what you paid for.

    --
    My other sig is crap too
  3. You get what you pay for. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Quality really seems to be a thing of the past. Cheaper != Better.

  4. Re:For me, great. by FireFury03 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I definitely prefer to go to shop, get the die, plug it in, run a test program for a few hours and have it replaced if I find any errors, than to pay some 80% extra for a sticker saying that some malaysian kid did it for me.

    Yes, because waiting for my mail order RAM to turn up, finding it's buggered and then having to spend a month trying to convince the supplier to get their finger out doing their slow-as-treacle RMA procedure is such a good use of my time... (Not to mention the very real chanced that the replacement RAM will be just as screwed)

    --
    http://blog.nexusuk.org
  5. Freemarket by XorNand · · Score: 4, Insightful
    What's the solution here?
    Huh? The freemarket seems like an ideal solution to me. Why do we need an external solution that entails fining/regulating them? If a company makes inferior product, odds are that they'll lose a large percentage of their customers. They'll be forced to either change their practices or go out of business.
    --
    Entrepreneur : (noun), French for "unemployed"
  6. Nothing New. by necrodeep · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The old saying stands true here... You get what you pay for. If you are going to only pay pennies on the dollar for Memory. Well you should expect a high number of failures.

    If your system memory is mission critical, you probably are going to buy top-shelf rather than bargain-basement, aren't you?

  7. Analogy for the world by jason.hall · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I believe we're slowly becoming a nation (world?) completely driven by prices at the expense of quality. I continuous hear things like "Why did he buy a Lexus for $50,000 when a new Hyundai is $15,000?" "This CD-R is $.10 each, this one is $.09. Why would anyone buy the $0.10 one?" People don't always get there's more to a product's specs than the price.

    1. Re:Analogy for the world by drinkypoo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The hyundai might be more reliable, actually. Lexus/Toyota has done some really stupid things. A car that costs $45,000 should not have ball joints that must be replaced with the entire upper suspension arm... where did all that money go, anyway? We're mostly slaves to advertising. Granted many people are free from that kind of bullshit, but most humans are susceptible.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  8. Simple Solution by mrRay720 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Really, it's easy. If they're selling untested, unmarked parts and this is a problem, just don't buy untested, unmarked parts! Let the market sort itself out. If the market decides that the cost saving here isn't worth it, the demand for slightly cheaper untested parts will surely dry up, and the manufacturers will catch on and stop trying to sell them.

    If there are enough people out there though who DO want the cost saving brought on by buying untested crap - let them! Nobody says you have to buy cheap crap if it's on the shelf. You get what you pay for. You want good quality - pay good money. You want bad quality - pay peanuts.

    Basic Economics, really. And it's not as if the likes of Crucial, Corsair, Kingston etc. are doing it.

    Why is this even an issue? I think it's commonly accepted wisdom EVERYWHERE that going for the lowest bidder will give you cheap rubbish. Computer components are no different.

  9. Not necesarily a problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This isn't necessarily a problem. If the yields on the DRAM chips are high enough, then it can make sense to NOT test the individual chips and instead wait to do the testing at the module (DIMM) level. If the chip yields are perhaps 95%, then the chance that a DIMM will be good is 0.95^8, or 66%. That may be high enough to make it worth while to avoid the cost of the chip testing.

    Now, if the chips are not tested AND the DIMMs are not tested, well that's another story...